Wait a minute, I said. Wasn’t the Model One around $4K/pair the last time I saw them? Indeed, they were. But the Qln One V7 now borrows extensively from the Qln Reference monitors, the $22K two-way monitor masterpiece that won out Product of the Year for 2022. This made even more sense, because I had been listening to the Qln One V7 for a couple of songs and I immediately thought, “This is a much more accomplished speaker than the old Model One, and even the $6,800/pair Prestige One monitors. If the Qln One V7 was still around $4K pair, they’d turn the two-way bookshelf market segment upside down.” The Qln One V7, despite its relatively diminutive size, sounded far closer to the Reference monitor than any other speaker in the Qln lines.
The rest of the system was comprised of some of my favorite brands–the Merason Reuss DAC ($6,000), the fabulous new flagship 300B integrated amplifier by Audio Hungary Qualiton ($11,000), the Innuos PULSAR streamer ($8,000), cables from Kubala-Sosna, power conditioning from Gigawatt and more. Mark told me he wanted to keep the entire system under $50K just to prove how much system you can buy for that kind of money, and he succeeded admirably. This was one of my favorite rooms at CAF 2024, and the Qln One V7 might have been my favorite two-way monitors at the show. I would have begged Mark right then and there for a chance to review the Qln One V7, but I’m actually getting in Qln’s flagship, the Reference 9s, instead. But will I be dreaming of the QLN One V7, with its tight and punchy bass and effortless tonality, in the meantime? Of course I will.